


Zoo

by dragonofdispair



Series: Vampiric Codex [5]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Gen, Horror, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-25
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2020-01-31 20:21:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18598729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonofdispair/pseuds/dragonofdispair
Summary: TF Speedwriting prompt - setting: a zoo.Alone, or so he thinks, Optimus wrestles with his own demons.





	Zoo

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta’d

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_Crush them._

This was one of the first things Megatron had returned to the surface to destroy. Empty and abandoned even then, Orion’s then-unnamed Autobots had let the vampire exorcize his rage on the empty cages and displays. Back then, Orion had hoped that after destroying this symbol of their long incarceration and humiliation, the newly escaped Decepticons would be open to negotiation. 

Instead they’d copied it. 

For his part, Optimus was content to let the gladiator pits, the cages, the displays that had shown off the vampires as entertainment to be gawked at, rust away into nothingness. The memory remained for them to learn from, but that was all that should. They did not need these displays to tempt them into thinking, as Ratchet often put it, that their nightmares could be conquered.

_Lie. You know how simple it would be. To burn them all to ash. To burn Cybertron clean._

He didn’t know why he kept returning here himself. Staring at this place wouldn’t help him. It was the ultimate temptation to drive in previous Primes’ tracks, to look at this rusting _zoo_ and know that _he_ had the power to remake it all. To end this war. He only needed to reach—

 _Here._ Power simmered next to Optimus’ spark, as terrible in it’s own way as the corruption of a vampire’s spark. It would be so easy to end it all...

“This is a bad place,” hissed a voice from the shadows. For a moment, Optimus’ realities blurred together and he saw Megatronus there, daring him to use the power that would bring all dark things to their knees...

But if Optimus did that, then he would be the nightmare.

Reality collapsed, and Optimus blinked away the afterimages to reveal a much different vampire than the massive gladiator-poet Orion had once believed in so fervently.

“It is,” he agreed, and Jazz crept forward. He was hunched over like a mechanimal, claws glinting in the moonlight. His fangs weren’t extended to their full length, but his mouth was open to pant and take in the scents around him, showing the fangs anyway. His helm tilted this way and that, jerkily responding to sounds Optimus couldn’t even imagine. He reminded Optimus of that caged feral Ratchet had caught to show Orion a vampire’s true monstrous nature, all predator and no veneer of civilized poet meant to put a mortal observer at ease and engender sympathy. But unlike that wretch, Jazz’s gaze was intelligent, considering, and not just patient, animal cunning. 

Jazz was not something Optimus had need to fear. Not for himself. The Prime was anathema to vampiric corruption. The Matrix burned the carriers on contact. Only Megatron had proven willing, or crazed, enough to risk it by engaging Optimus in combat. That protection would not protect anyone else from Jazz, and every time he saw the vampire walking free he was torn between fear and need. He wanted Ratchet’s efforts to negotiate with that monstrous nature to succeed, but he feared Prowl was right and that Jazz couldn’t be trusted. 

_Burn it clean. All of your enemies..._

“What are you doing out here?” he asked, keeping his voice mild. He did not know how the vampire would react to suspicion. 

Under the blue visor that hid his red optics from view, Jazz wrinkled his nasal ridge, struggling with the words to answer. Words, as Ratchet had explained, were hard, and not for the first time Optimus wondered what it meant that Megatronus had managed to be a poet for a time.

“Looking,” Jazz finally said. 

“Looking?” Looking for what? Other vampires? Did the scent of the mechs who’d been kept in these cages linger strongly enough for Jazz’s inhuman senses to pick them out? Or was he looking for prey, homeless mechs driven from under the plate to live in the abandoned former-battlefields of the surface?

_You can stop this. You can save them._

“Looking for Ricochet,” Jazz clarified, and Optimus’ suspicion popped like a soap bubble. Oh. Of _course._ His twin.

Sheepish to have fallen into the trap of believing vampires — Jazz — cared for nothing but his next meal, Optimus beckoned the mech closer. It was not, he heard Ratchet’s voice warn, so much of a trap. Only a well-fed vampire could care for anything else, and Jazz was still very young. But Optimus found hope in Jazz’s search. That he cared enough to search. 

Considering him with a sideways glance, as though wondering just what it would gain him to accept the Prime’s invitation, Jazz stood silently. Selfish creature. Optimus couldn’t fault him that; being near the Prime was objectively dangerous for him, even if they weren’t fighting. 

What other things had Ratchet said Jazz liked? Soft things, knicknacks — especially ones that made noise — baths, candy. It wasn’t like Optimus could offer to groom—

“Not food,” he finally declared, turning away from Optimus. 

_He fears the Light..._

“No, I’m not.” Next time he’d have some of the vampire-safe candies to tempt him, he thought, but for now... He picked up a broken part of the nearest cage, a short, jagged, pole. “And touching me would hurt, but I can use this to scratch your back or shoulders.”

That made Jazz turn back, obviously interested. _He’s not like a mech,_ Optimus thought. Jazz’s motives were so very alien, and a little nerve wracking to behold. 

Jazz finally crept forward warily, armor bristling in threat, but far too tempted by Optimus’ offer to refuse outright. Optimus despaired that he so easily accepted that mechs would be hostile to him. He remembered that when Ratchet had first found him moonstruck in the rubble, he hadn’t understood that hostility was dangerous. Now he seemed to understand that mortals were dangerous far too well. 

Still, Optimus wasn’t acting hostile, and was offering something he wanted, and he seemed unable to resist. 

The vampire went to his knees in front of Optimus like a supplicant. He almost protested being knelt to, but Ratchet said that training Jazz to be nonthreatening when he interacted with mortals was essential and Optimus did not want to undermine that without careful consideration. 

Instead he did what he’d offered to do and used the rusted pole to scratch gently at places he didn’t think Jazz could reach for himself. Jazz let out a soft sound Optimus took to be pleasure, and continued. 

This, _this_ was why Optimus couldn’t give into his own personal temptation. Jazz had made a choice to stay, to fight for them, and to live with mortals rather than hunt them. He had selfish reasons for that choice. Ratchet had offered him fuel he didn’t need to endanger himself to get, took care fo his needs, and Prowl gave him a purpose beyond those base desires... but _choice_ it had been. If Optimus unleashed the power of the Matrix... 

_To end all suffering. To wipe away all of the dark places, until nothing is left but the everlasting Light._

...used it against his enemies... Jazz would suffer alongside the Decepticons. Jazz and others who would choose the same, if given the chance.

Optimus let Jazz decide where the best places to scratch would be, and made a note to see if there was something better than a broken pole to do this touch-at-a-distance with in the future. 

His comsuite crackled to life. _“Prime,”_ Prowl greeted. _“Mirage just reported that Jazz disappeared after their mission. He might be hunting. Permission to—“_

 _“Denied,”_ Optimus interrupted patiently. Prowl’s distrust of vampires was well-known, and likely justified... except when it wasn’t. Besides, hadn’t he thought the same thing when he first saw Jazz creeping through this ruin? _“Jazz is here, with me.”_ Hunting, after a fashion, at least until he’d distracted him, but not for living energon. _“He was looking for his twin.”_

Prowl fell silent for a moment. _“We should forbid this foolish search. Jazz should not be allowed to wander off like this, and what do you think we’re going to do with a... a Decepticon or a feral if Jazz should happen to find him?”_

 _“I do not know,”_ Optimus said quietly, watching Jazz happily rub against a broken stick, as though he could not think of anything better than this moment right now. _“But it is Jazz’s right, and his twin deserves the chance to make a choice about what he is.”_

_... Burn the world clean of all darkness. My bearer, my tool, it is time to remake the world..._

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End

**Author's Note:**

> Here is a link to the [Vampiric Codex Official Timeline](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uS2EX-d3Npd00EkN2SxOa7010AUFPI0TVqiS2vbnsbQ/edit?usp=sharing).


End file.
